The Senate Watergate Committee was created promptly after it was learned that Richard Nixon’s staff had broken into the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate Complex and had performed other illegal activities involving espionage and sabotage.

The committee played an enormous part in investigating the President and his staff’s wrongdoing.

The committee’s investigation ended in the indictment of forty members of Nixon’s staff and the articles of impeachment being filed against the President which prompted Tricky Dick’s resignation from office.

Around 319 hours of the Committee’s hearings were televised on the three major television networks and were seen by a reported 85% of American households.

The hearings revealed the existence of the infamous Nixon White House Tapes, introduced the key players in the conspiracy, and were best summed up by Howard Baker’s famous line, “What did the President know and when did he know it?”

THE COMMITTEE’S FINDINGS AND FALLOUT

THE SENATE WATERGATE COMMITTEE’S MEMBERS

The committee was made up of seven senators and two chief counsels, Sam Dash for the Democrats and the man who would become Senator, actor, and Presidential Candidate, Fred Thompson for the Republicans.

Four of the seven Senators were from the Democratic Senate Majority and the other three were Republicans.

Representing the Democrats was Chairman of the Senate Watergate Committee Sam Ervin of North Carolina, Daniel Inouye of Hawaii (the only man still serving in the Senate), Joseph Montoya of New Mexico, and former two-term Governor of Georgia Senator Herman Talmadge.

Representing the Republicans were Ranking Member of the Committee Howard Baker of Tennessee who would go on to become Senate Majority Leader and one of Ronald Reagan’s Chiefs of Staff, Edward Gurney of Florida, and Lowell Weicker of Connecticut who would go on to become the state’s governor.

THE WATERGATE FALLOUT

The findings of the Senate Watergate Committee led to the indictment of forty Nixon Administration officials, including Nixon’s top aides.

Nixon found himself in a bad spot as following the Committee hearings the House of Representatives introduced articles of impeachment against him and criminal charges were filed.

Nixon resigned from the office before he could be impeached and still holds the dishonor of being the only President to ever resign from office.

The Committee served as a way to break down the fourth wall and take a good, disgusted look into the White House and the Nixon Administration which had been so secretive since Nixon came to power in 1968.

The Senate Watergate Committee hearings also produced the infamous Richard Nixon White House tapes which allowed the American public a look inside the mind of the criminal that they had elected in the largest landslide in American history. Nixon had won the 1972 election winning 49 of the 50 states and compiling 520 electoral votes.

Gerald Ford, the Speaker of the House of Representatives who became Vice-President when Spiro Agnew resigned, took over the Presidency and ultimately pardoned the former President in a very unpopular move. Ford, who had been elected to office by all of 118,000 in Michigan, was able to squeeze by Ronald Reagan in the primaries but was edged out by Jimmy Carter in the Presidential race that featured two of the worst candidates ever.

It was only because of Carter’s horrid Presidency that Ronald Reagan and the Republicans were able to recover so quickly from the Nixon Presidency.

THE WATERGATE LEGACY

The Watergate legacy involves more than just the addition of “gate” to every scandal in the country and serving as the precedent for Presidential corruption.

Up until Nixon, the President, and those who held the seat like Lincoln, Roosevelt, and Kennedy, were considered sacred. Richard Nixon dishonored his office in incredible ways and removed nearly all of the sacredness from the White House.

Watergate began a new era in American politics that continues to this day.

Not only is this era that of a complete, though well deserved, distrust of American politicians, but it ushered in new political regimes.

The Democratic Party followed in the footsteps of Jimmy Carter and became a group of liberal ideologues who never delivered and were simply too naïve to really be trusted to govern.

The Republicans, after laughing at Goldwater and Reagan in 1964, crowned the Goldwater ideology and the leadership of Ronald Regan the new epitome of the Republican Party that they have refused to detach from since, in theory if not in practice.